Oxford explained

Oxford explained Books Journal articles Web and video Other sources

Different units at Deakin use different referencing styles. Always check your unit assessment information to find which style you are required to use.

Note: There are a number of interpretations of the Oxford style referencing used by different publishers and universities. Check with your teacher, supervisor or publisher whether you are required to follow a variant of Oxford that differs from the advice presented in this guide.

Deakin guide to Oxford (PDF, 639.5 KB)

Last updated: 6 March 2024

Overview
First citations
Subsequent citations
Bibliography
Number of authors
Group author
No author
No date
No page numbers
Source within a source
Quotation style

Overview

The Oxford style of referencing consists of:

A superscript (raised) number in the body of the text that refers to a footnote at the bottom of the page.
Footnotes provide the bibliographic details of a source and are numbered consecutively throughout a paper or chapter.
Endnotes are an alternative to footnotes. They appear at the end of a paper or chapter.
A bibliography is a full list of sources cited, sources consulted in preparing a paper, and other sources thought to be of interest to the reader. The list is ordered alphabetically according to the family name of the first author.

This guide is based on the New Oxford Style Manual (Oxford: OUP, 2016).

First citations

Sources need to be cited wherever ideas from those sources are discussed, summarised, paraphrased or quoted.

Footnotes

The first time a source is cited in a paper or chapter, the footnote should provide the full bibliographic details of the source, including the author, title, year of publication and other publication details.

For quotes and paraphrases, provide a page number or alternative marker (e.g. section, paragraph), where possible, in the footnote.
For summaries or general references to works, you do not have to provide a page number, but you may wish to provide one in order to direct the reader to a specific passage in the text.

In all footnotes, regardless of the source type:

Two or three authors
– use an ampersand ‘&’ between the last two authors.
More than three authors
– include the family name of the first-listed author only, followed by ‘et al.’
All titles
– all main words begin with a capital letter.
Titles of publications
– e.g. books, journals and websites – are formatted in italics
Titles of works within publication
– e.g. articles, chapters, web pages – are placed within single quote marks

Here is an example of a first citation from a book:

Kostof notes, 'Ggantija is a wholly manmade form, which is to say it is thought out and reproduceable'.¹

^1. S. Kostof, A History of Architecture: Settings and Rituals (2nd edn, New York: OUP, 1995), 35.

Here is an example of a first citation from a journal article:

…while others provide ethical guidance in the relationship between researchers and participants.²³

^23. L. Allemann S. Dudeck, ‘Sharing Oral Histories With Arctic Indigenous Communities: Ethical Implications of Bringing Back Research’, Qualitative Inquiry, 25/9–10 (Nov/Dec 2019), 899, https://doi.org/10.1177/1077800417738800

Bibliography

Sources cited in footnotes require corresponding entries in the bibliography:

Allemann, L. Dudeck, S., ‘Sharing Oral Histories With Arctic Indigenous Communities: Ethical Implications of Bringing Back Research’, Qualitative Inquiry, 25/9–10 (Nov/Dec 2019), 890–906, https://doi.org/10.1177/1077800417738800

Kostof, S., A History of Architecture: Settings and Rituals (2nd edn, New York: OUP, 1995).

How do bibliography entries differ from footnotes?

In a bibliography:

The entry begins with the family name of the first author
Entries are arranged alphabetically according to the family names of authors.
A hanging indent style of paragraph is used.
Specific page numbers or sections of text cited is not given.
The full page range of book chapters and journal articles is included.

Subsequent citations

Footnotes

When sources are referred to more than once in a paper or chapter, full bibliographic details do not need to be given after the initial footnote.

For subsequent citations of the same work, provide the:

family name only
shortened (but accurate) title of the article, book or other source
relevant page numbers specific to each citation.

⁵^. S. Kostof, A History of Architecture: Settings and Rituals (2nd edn, New York: OUP, 1995), 35.

⁶^. Kostof, A History of Architecture, 41–45.

^7.H. Gardner, Gardner's Art through the Ages (6th edn, New York: Harcourt Brace, 1975), 31.

^8. Kostof, A History of Architecture, 38.

Where you need to cite the same source multiple times in a single paragraph, cite using only a single footnote. However, if it cannot be made clear which text in your work is being cited, then you may need to use multiple footnotes to the same source in a single paragraph.

Bibliography

Each source cited requires a corresponding entry in the bibliography:

Gardner, H., Gardner's Art through the Ages (6th edn, New York: Harcourt Brace, 1975).

Kostof, S., A History of Architecture: Settings and Rituals (2nd edn, New York: OUP, 1995).

Bibliography

A bibliography is an alphabetically ordered list at the end of paper or chapter that includes:

all the sources cited in the paper
other sources consulted in preparing the paper
other sources that might be of interest to the reader.

Sample Bibliography

Allemann, L. & Dudeck, S., ‘Sharing Oral Histories With Artic Indigenous Communities: Ethical Implications of Bringing Back Research’, Qualitative Inquiry, 25/9–10 (Nov/Dec 2019), 890–906, https://doi.org/10.1177/1077800417738800

Arakawa, Y., Zen Painting, tr. J. Bester (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1970).

Arnau, E. et al., ‘The Extended Cognition Thesis: Its Significance for the Philosophy of (Cognitive) Science’, Philosophical Psychology, 27/1 (Feb. 2014), 15–17, https://doi.org/10.1080/09515089.2013.836081

Australian Bureau of Statistics, ‘Industrial Disputes, Australia, June 2013’, cat. no. 6321.0.55.001, (5 Sep 2013), https://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/Lookup/6321.0.55.001Main+Features1Jun%202013, accessed Mar 2020.

Crafti, S., 'Winning Design Moored in Spain', The Age, Business Day (25 Aug. 2010), 16.

Gardner, H., Gardner's Art through the Ages (6th edn, New York: Harcourt Brace, 1975).

Goldthwaite, R.A., 'The Florentine Palace as Domestic Architecture', American Historical Review, 77/4 (1972), 977–1012, https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr/77.4.977

Gombrich, E.H., 'The Early Medicis as Patrons of Art', in E.F. Jacob, ed., Italian Renaissance Studies (London: Faber & Faber, 1960), 279–311.

Martin, S.K., ‘Tracking Reading in Nineteenth-Century Melbourne Diaries’, Australian Humanities Review, 56 (May 2014), http://www.australianhumanitiesreview.org, accessed 23 June 2020.

Porter, R., ‘Lion of the Laboratory’, review of G.L. Geison, The Private Science of Louis Pasteur (Princeton, 1995), in TLS (16 June 1995), 3–4.

Rutten, E., Fedor J., & Zvereva, V., eds., Memory, Conflict and New Media: Web Wars in Post-Socialist States (Milton Park: Routledge, 2013).

Specter, M., ‘The Dangerous Philosopher’, The Graduate Forum NYU (2 Apr. 2001), http://www.cns.nyu.edu/~pillow/gradforum/materials/DangerousPhilosopher.pdf, accessed 3 Feb. 2020.

How do entries in the bibliography differ from footnotes?

In a bibliography:

The entry begins with the family name of the first author
Entries are arranged alphabetically according to the family names of authors.
A hanging indent style of paragraph is used.
Specific page numbers or sections of text cited is not given.
The full page range of book chapters and journal articles is included.

Otherwise, the same rules apply to both footnotes and the bibliography:

Two or three authors – use an ampersand ‘&’ between the last two authors.
More than three authors – include the family name of the first-listed author only, followed by ‘et al.’
All titles – all main words begin with a capital letter.
Titles of publications – e.g. books, journals and websites – are formatted in italics
Titles of works within publication – e.g. articles, chapters, web pages – are placed within single quote marks.

Note: There is no need to divide a bibliography into subsections unless you have been instructed to do so (e.g. into sections for primary and secondary sources).

Number of authors

Footnotes

Authors’ names should be in the order they appear in the publication
An author can be an organisation.

One author

^21. R.A. Goldthwaite, 'The Florentine Palace as Domestic Architecture', American Historical Review, 77/4 (1972), 978, https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr/77.4.977

Two to three authors

Separate the final two authors with an ampersand ‘&’.

^23. L. Allemann & S. Dudeck, ‘Sharing Oral Histories With Arctic Indigenous Communities: Ethical Implications of Bringing Back Research’, Qualitative Inquiry, 25/9–10 (Nov/Dec 2019), 899, https://doi.org/10.1177/1077800417738800

Four or more authors

Include only the family name of the first-listed author, followed by ‘et al.’ (meaning 'and others').

^36. E. Arnau et al., ‘The Extended Cognition Thesis: Its Significance for the Philosophy of (Cognitive) Science’, Philosophical Psychology, 27/1 (Feb. 2014), 16, https://doi.org/10.1080/09515089.2013.836081

Bibliography

Allemann, L. & Dudeck, S., ‘Sharing Oral Histories With Arctic Indigenous Communities: Ethical Implications of Bringing Back Research’, Qualitative Inquiry, 25/9–10 (Nov/Dec 2019), 890–906, https://doi.org/10.1177/1077800417738800

Goldthwaite, R.A., 'The Florentine Palace as Domestic Architecture', American Historical Review, 77/4 (1972), 977–1012, https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr/77.4.977

Group author

Sometimes the author is an organisation, government agency, association or corporate body.

Cite the full name of the organisation.
If the publisher is identical to the author, there is no need to repeat the publisher’s name.

Footnotes

^1. Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works, Proposed Common Use Infrastructure on Christmas Island (Canberra: Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, 2002), 52.

^2. Amnesty International, Prisoners Without a Voice: Asylum Seekers in the United Kingdom (London, 1995), 41.

Bibliography

The entry is listed alphabetically under the name of the organisation (excluding ‘The’).

Amnesty International, Prisoners Without a Voice: Asylum Seekers in the United Kingdom (London, 1995).

Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works, Proposed Common Use Infrastructure on Christmas Island (Canberra: Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, 2002).

No author

For works that do not provide the name of an author, the citation should begin with the title of the work.

For example, here is an online encyclopaedia entry with no author:

Footnotes

^5. ‘Gunpowder Plot’, Encyclopaedia Britannica (2019), http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/249505/Gunpowder-Plot, accessed 5 Aug. 2020.

Bibliography

‘Gunpowder Plot’, Encyclopaedia Britannica (2019), http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/249505/Gunpowder-Plot, accessed 5 Aug. 2020.

No date

If a source has no publication date, use the latest copyright date.
If no date can be found, use ‘n.d.’ in place of a date.
If there is no date because the source is a forthcoming journal article, see the topic in this guide: In-press.

Footnotes

^23. U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. and World Population Clock (U.S. Department of Commerce, n.d.), https://www.census.gov/popclock, accessed 9 Aug. 2020.

Bibliography

U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. and World Population Clock (U.S. Department of Commerce, n.d.), https://www.census.gov/popclock, accessed 9 Aug. 2020.

No page numbers

If your source has no page numbers (for example, some e-books and online articles are not paginated) then cite another locator within the source, such as a chapter, sub-heading or paragraph number.

For example, here is a citation of an online journal article with no page numbers where a sub-heading has been used as a locator.

Footnotes

Author, ‘Title of Article’, Title of Journal, issue/volume (Month Year), Title of Sub-heading, DOI

^8. E. Arnau et al., ‘The Extended Cognition Thesis: Its Significance for the Philosophy of (Cognitive) Science’, Philosophical Psychology, 27/1 (Feb. 2014), The EC Thesis and Cognitive Approaches, https://doi.org/10.1080/09515089.2013.836081

Bibliography

Author, A., ‘Title of Article’, Title of Journal, issue/volume (Month Year), DOI

Arnau, E. et al., ‘The Extended Cognition Thesis: Its Significance for the Philosophy of (Cognitive) Science’, Philosophical Psychology, 27/1 (Feb. 2014), https://doi.org/10.1080/09515089.2013.836081

Source within a source

Footnote

When citing an author (who you have not read) who has been cited by another author (who you have read):

provide the full bibliographic details of both works in the footnote.
use the phrase ‘cited in’
include the page number of the work that you have read.

In the example below, the student has read a book by Brown, in which is cited a book by Smith, but the student has not read Smith.

^10. A. Smith, Italian Architecture (Melbourne: Penguin, 2000) cited in D. Brown, Renaissance Italy (London: Faber & Faber, 2002), 45.

Bibliography

Provide only the details of the source you have read.

Brown, D., Renaissance Italy (London: Faber & Faber, 2002).

Quotation style

Before quoting your source, first consider whether it would be more appropriate to paraphrase your source. We recommend using quotes sparingly.

Whether you are summarising, paraphrasing or quoting sources, include a citation.

In addition, quotes and paraphrases should always be accompanied by your commentary and analysis – and clearly support your response to the assessment task.

Use single quotation marks for short quotes.

Kostof notes that ‘Ggantija is a wholly manmade form, which is to say it is thought out and reproduceable’.¹ This can be interpreted as …

For longer quotes:

do not use quotation marks
start the quote on a new line
indent the quote on the both the left and the right
use a font one size smaller.

Morley-Warner suggests that students should focus on how journal articles in their subject are written and structured. She describes another benefit of this process:

You will also gain a sense of the complexity of being an apprentice writer in an academic culture, or rather cultures, where expectations may vary from discipline to discipline, even subject to subject and where you can build a repertoire of critical thinking and writing skills that enable you to enter the academic debates, even to challenge.²⁴

However, Morely-Warner fails to address how students might…

Overview

The Oxford style of referencing consists of:

A superscript (raised) number in the body of the text that refers to a footnote at the bottom of the page.
Footnotes provide the bibliographic details of a source and are numbered consecutively throughout a paper or chapter.
Endnotes are an alternative to footnotes. They appear at the end of a paper or chapter.
A bibliography is a full list of sources cited, sources consulted in preparing a paper, and other sources thought to be of interest to the reader. The list is ordered alphabetically according to the family name of the first author.

This guide is based on the New Oxford Style Manual (Oxford: OUP, 2016).

First citations

Sources need to be cited wherever ideas from those sources are discussed, summarised, paraphrased or quoted.

Footnotes

For quotes and paraphrases, provide a page number or alternative marker (e.g. section, paragraph), where possible, in the footnote.
For summaries or general references to works, you do not have to provide a page number, but you may wish to provide one in order to direct the reader to a specific passage in the text.

In all footnotes, regardless of the source type:

Two or three authors
– use an ampersand ‘&’ between the last two authors.
More than three authors
– include the family name of the first-listed author only, followed by ‘et al.’
All titles
– all main words begin with a capital letter.
Titles of publications
– e.g. books, journals and websites – are formatted in italics
Titles of works within publication
– e.g. articles, chapters, web pages – are placed within single quote marks

Here is an example of a first citation from a book:

Kostof notes, 'Ggantija is a wholly manmade form, which is to say it is thought out and reproduceable'.¹

^1. S. Kostof, A History of Architecture: Settings and Rituals (2nd edn, New York: OUP, 1995), 35.

Here is an example of a first citation from a journal article:

…while others provide ethical guidance in the relationship between researchers and participants.²³

Bibliography

Sources cited in footnotes require corresponding entries in the bibliography:

Kostof, S., A History of Architecture: Settings and Rituals (2nd edn, New York: OUP, 1995).

How do bibliography entries differ from footnotes?

In a bibliography:

The entry begins with the family name of the first author
Entries are arranged alphabetically according to the family names of authors.
A hanging indent style of paragraph is used.
Specific page numbers or sections of text cited is not given.
The full page range of book chapters and journal articles is included.

Subsequent citations

Footnotes

When sources are referred to more than once in a paper or chapter, full bibliographic details do not need to be given after the initial footnote.

For subsequent citations of the same work, provide the:

family name only
shortened (but accurate) title of the article, book or other source
relevant page numbers specific to each citation.

⁵^. S. Kostof, A History of Architecture: Settings and Rituals (2nd edn, New York: OUP, 1995), 35.

⁶^. Kostof, A History of Architecture, 41–45.

^7.H. Gardner, Gardner's Art through the Ages (6th edn, New York: Harcourt Brace, 1975), 31.

^8. Kostof, A History of Architecture, 38.

Bibliography

Each source cited requires a corresponding entry in the bibliography:

Gardner, H., Gardner's Art through the Ages (6th edn, New York: Harcourt Brace, 1975).

Kostof, S., A History of Architecture: Settings and Rituals (2nd edn, New York: OUP, 1995).

Bibliography

A bibliography is an alphabetically ordered list at the end of paper or chapter that includes:

all the sources cited in the paper
other sources consulted in preparing the paper
other sources that might be of interest to the reader.